


Studying Abroad

by MissesMarvellous



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Student/Teacher, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Skinny!Steve, Slow Burn, Stucky - Freeform, Teacher-Student Relationship, and a little slutty, bucky is a TA, but it's college so it's legal, oldschool stucky fanfic, romcom, so you know it's about to get very unprofessional, student teacher au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-06
Updated: 2020-03-24
Packaged: 2021-02-25 06:48:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 19,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22151827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissesMarvellous/pseuds/MissesMarvellous
Summary: Steve is finishing his masters abroad in Germany and get's stuck in an eight-hour-long-course every Friday. He is saved from this misery by the friendly TA: James Barnes. Soon Steve developes a crush on him and has to deal with finals, stress, drama and the terribly scary realization that his crush might actually like him back.Infos:I found myself craving the 2015/2016-style Stucky-ffs, that I loved to read a lot back then, so I decided so get back on this site and try to fill my craving with some old-school Stucky-writing.AU!2010s-Setting; AU!Marvel-Characters will appear in the background of this story; tags are added (chapter after chapter), as well as new characters; triggerwarnings are going to be in the notes before every chapter.-PLOT with a little bit of porn-
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 1
Kudos: 77





	1. The one where Steve meets his new TA

**Author's Note:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: No  
> \- Other: Strong language, alcohol
> 
> Revised: yes
> 
> Hello! I have written a lenghy oneshot with the university-AU, if you are interested in reading more, whilst waiting on updates here. If you want to check it out please visit my profile! :)

It was almost 10am and his eight-hour-course-from-hell was just about to start. What did he smoke the day he decided to take this class? The course was on Fridays, 10am to 6pm: seven weeks of hard work, then the final exam, just before the winter break. More time for the rest of the classes in the second half of the semester, he had thought. C’mon it’s only seven weeks, how hard could that be, huh?

He hated his past self, walking through the crisp morning-air towards his building. It was autumn and the small town in south Germany, Bavaria, to be precise, sure looked the part. Dramatic piles of red leaves laid left and right of the century-old cobblestone-roads, the windows were tinted with frost and everyone who walked these streets beside him was covered in layers of thick winter coats and wool scarves. Steve loved studying here. He did not speak much German but the people were kind and loving and warm – and most importantly damn good at teaching. And where to study art history, if not in Europe? Every inch of this part of the world was covered in history.

And frost apparently. So much damn frost.

He took out a tissue from his coat-pocket and shivered. His nose was running and his eyes were watery. He did not expect this kind of cold-weather. In his mind, Germany had always been warm and summery. But it was October and already near the 32°F-mark and his coat was not nearly thick enough.

Steve had only been here for a couple of weeks but now the semester had started and shit was about to get real. He knew the building he had to get to from orientation. It was a huge complex with two main wings, four libraries, a cafeteria and some shops around the entrance area. His area of interest was in the left wing, third floor. Located there was the entrance to his library, the offices of his professors and the day-long course he so foolishly had taken. He glanced at his phone and decided that he had enough time to get there by foot.

Bad idea.

Working himself up the stairs he did not mind the heaps of people passing him. He had to take his time; otherwise he would probably cough up half his lungs before getting there. Asthma was a bitch, but Steve was much more of a bitch, which was why he took the stairs in the first place. Some little part of him actually thought that taking the stairs and walking, instead of taking the train, would somehow piss his diseases off to a point, where they would leave him alone. That was, of course, not the case, it did however made him shaky, sweaty and a little out of breath.

“Hey Steve”, Peggy, one of the TAs, popped up next to him. She was the one who had showed around him and the other the exchange students. Her dissertation-project was on modern English literature and it was quite fascinating. Her minor in undergrad had been art history, which was why she and Steve had gotten along so well from the start. He smiled calmly and tried to catch his breath in a way that did not make him look like the 80-year-old woman he felt like. The one thing he really hated about Europe was that everything had stairs or was located on some kind of steep-ass hill.

“You alright?”

Keep it together Rogers!

He gave her a weak nod, which she did not buy. Peggy pulled him towards one of the tables next to the elevators in the second floor. This floor was, thankfully, mostly empty, since it was inhabited by the department for Latin and Ancient Greek.

“Yeah”, he took a couple of deep breaths and blinked excessively to stop his eyes from starting to water again. “Except for me being a dumbass and taking an eight-hour-long course today.”

“Ouch, that does sound pretty dumb!” She laughed and took out her water bottle. “Well”, she took a sip, “if it’s any consolation, I got quite the day, too.”

“Colloquium?”

“Yep! Twice.” She made a grimace and shook her head, “four hours of people telling themselves that they’ll definitely start writing that one very important chapter of their dissertation soon. It’s quite ridiculous.”

Steve smiled.

“Why are you so happy, mister?”

“You sound very British right now.”

The tall, dark haired woman scoffed at his remark. Ever since they met, Steve had had a lot of fun pointing out her obvious British behavior. But to be fair, she started the week out by inviting them all to tea time in her office, so she really did bring this on herself.

A quick glance at the time made him jump up, “shit! I gotta go to class. You wanna hang out on the weekend?” He turned around and starting jogging in the direction of the stairs, trying really hard not to pass out, before Peggy could answer.

“Sure thing, I’ll text you!” He could hear her wide grin in the sentence and had to suppress laughter. He needed all the air he had for the stairs.

The course-room had a beautiful window front with a nice view of the park right next to the building, a wide blackboard with two names on it and a set of tables that were put into a U-shape. Steve awkwardly made his way towards the window-row and sat down at an empty table. There were around 25 other people in the room. On the front of the U, at the blackboard, stood a middle-aged man in a dark blue shirt and khaki-pants. He fumbled around with a cord, trying to connect the projector with his bulky-looking laptop. Steve tried to calm himself down. His breath was still shaky, but he managed to pull out his notebook and the required reading materials without dropping anything.

The door opened again and Steve, lifting his head at the noise, saw a handsome guy enter the room and heading up to the professor.

Damn. What a guy.

They talked briefly before the man sat down one table over from Steve. A young woman hastily began packing her things, mumbling something about being in the wrong class. Steve smiled into one of the books he brought. Happened to him yesterday. Poor girl. As she ran out of the room, the professor finally got his PowerPoint to work and smiled into the room. Steve and the handsome guy were now the only ones sitting on the window-side of the room. All the other 23 people sat either at the side with the door or facing the blackboard. Steve had no idea why, but he felt extremely awkward, like he wasn’t supposed to be here.

“Hello”, the professor ripped him from his weird thoughts, “I am professor Coulson and I will be teaching you this semester together with Miss,” he laughed, “no, Mister Barnes here. Excuse the hiccup, my usual TA is needed elsewhere but thankfully I got someone to fill in for her. So, if you have any questions please direct them to my new right hand here.” He gestured towards the handsome man, who now quickly stood up and nodded.

“Yes, that is right. I am here to help you, but please go easy on me – I am usually working in English lit, art history was only my minor. But I will help you all with your assignments, any basic questions and, of course, the logistics.” He smiled timidly and sat back down.

“That’s right”, Mr. Coulson grinned at Mr. Barnes, “I had the pleasure to teach Mr. Barnes here, back when he was an undergrad and I am thrilled to find out what he remembers from that time, if”, his grin got wider, “anything at all.” Everybody laughed and Steve took the opportunity to take a closer look at this TA. The guy was proper beautiful. At least 6 feet, quite fit with dark, slightly curly, short hair, a light 5-o’clock-shadow and brown-ish eyes - all that packed away into a tightly fitting red shirt, that revealed some nice upper arms, and dark jeans. He had to be in the same program as Peggy, so why did he get to sit here and she had so go to their colloquiums? Steve was curious, but also scared to get caught staring, so he averted his eyes down to the reading material and started thinking about fragments of statues and painted vases in old Macedonian graves.

He felt like he was being watched from his right side, the one where the TA sat, and clumsily tried acting natural, yet still sexy. Yeah Steve, like this guy had nothing better to do than watching you. He gave up 20 minutes later when he accidentally coloured half his hands with a brush pen and – upon checking with a quick glance – noticed, that the TA was actually busy typing aggressively fast on his laptop.

After the first four hours of mostly reading and discussing some basics, they decided to break for lunch and scattered; only Steve decided to stay in the room. Well, not just Steve. The TA quickly got out of the room and came back five minutes later with some coffee and a cinnamon roll.

Great. Alone with the hot guy. What could go wrong? Steve lifted his head as a reflex, when the door opened again, and swiftly made eye contact with the surprised TA. Oh god no.

“Oh? Not going out for lunch?” He circled back to the row of desks at the window and dropped his food there, looking over to Steve, who tried thinking of an excuse that would not make it sound like he was a loner. After around five seconds of weird silence, he decided to just tell the truth.

“Nah, I got my lunch with me and to be frank, the outside is way too cold here. I did not pack for this kind of weather!” Steve laughed awkwardly and watched the TA go over to the blackboard. How beautiful could a man be? Like, seriously - how was that allowed? And he was smart too? Steve actually got light headed for half a second and caught himself staring at the TAs butt just in time to cut it out before the other man turned around again.

“So you haven’t been here long?” Mr. Barnes put some markers back on Mr. Coulsons desk and then sat down next to Steve. His eyes observed him, while he drank his coffee. The scrawny guy shifted on his chair, unwilling to meet the eyes of his desk-neighbor. Thankfully he did not seem to take offence in that.

“No, just about two weeks. I’m from Brooklyn, transferred here for my masters.”

“Wow!”, the TA grinned, “I started off exactly the same. Came here from Brooklyn for my last year as an undergrad and stayed for my doctorate. Well, the beginning of it anyways. I don’t think I’ll finish it here, you would think the program is easier in countries that don’t have English as their main language but no, it’s the other way around. I love it though.” His eyes starting glowing, as he was describing his field of study and Steve just sat there for a little while, eating his lunch, listening.

“Oh my god, what am I doing? I am sorry for talking so much, I just really love what I do and to meet someone from home – I guess that opened the floodgates. I’m James, by the way – or Bucky, if you want.” Steve shook his hand and swallowed the rest of his lunch. His hands were quite sturdy, but warm and somewhat inviting. Oh no! He could not develop a crush on his TA, that would be too much of a cliché!

“Hi James, I’m Steve.” He took a second to ground himself. All things aside, it actually was quite nice meet someone from home. Even better, if he looked like that but oh well. “No worries, I get it. Brooklyn is far away and ever since I got here I’ve been so overwhelmed. It’s nice to know that there is someone here that gets it.” Steve had a crushing feeling in his gut, as he noticed other people coming back into the room. Break was over and so was his little chat with James. They got back to work and a little over three hours later he was finally free. Six more Fridays were waiting for him and Steve had no idea how to survive. Well, that was a lie. He had a little bit of an idea; he was very sure, that it was a very bad idea, but it would definitely help him to get through those days.

Just as he was about to get his things and leave, he spotted James walking towards the elevator.

Fuck it.

“Hey Bucky, wait up!” Steve was unsure if it was okay to use the nickname or not, but to his surprise the TA turned around and smiled widely. This guy.

“Hey Steve, long day huh?” The elevator opened and they got in.

“Say”, Steve pressed the button and the door closed, “do you by any chance know Peggy Carter?”

“Peggy? Yeah, she is in my program. How do you know her?”

“She walked me and the other foreign students around the other day and I just wondered, since you both are in the same program, but she got a full day of colloquiums and you don’t.”

“Ah”, James stepped out of the elevator and waited for Steve to follow him through the main hall, “this seminar counts for that, since it’s roughly related to my project. I still got to meet up with the others twice a month which is, believe it or not”, he sighted deeply, “more than enough.”

Steve grinned, “oh yeah, I heard a lot of bad stuff from Peggy about those gatherings.”

They got out of the building and stood there for a couple of seconds, “where are you off to?” James took out his phone and swiftly wiped over his eyes. He looked tired. Yet still very good. God, Steve really had to stop this kind of thinking. “I gotta get some food and then head home. I have a construction zone right out front, so I gotta get to bed early. They start every morning at 8, even on Saturdays and I want to murder them for it. You?”

Steve had to think for a second. “I live up on the hill, behind the inner city, but I am going to get a drink with a friend first and then drive home. I don’t have anything planned tomorrow and no evil construction workers around, so I can sleep in.” He grinned.

“Stop smiling, you look way to happy about my misery.” James’ laughter turned into a groan, as they watched a tram pull into it’s station a few hundred yards away. “That’s me, gotta go. Hope you have a nice evening! See you next Friday!” He sprinted away and Steve was left there to stare after him. Now that he was finally alone he could feel his legs turn into pudding.

His needy, bisexual ass was way too happy about these long Fridays and the rest of his body did not agree with it. Everything hurt, but his mind was filled to the brim with James’ smile. Steve looked forward to drawing that this weekend – among some other things. He pulled himself together and started walking into the direction of the pub his friend set out to meet at.


	2. The one in the pub

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: No  
> \- Other: Strong language, (not serious) mention of suicide, slight sexism
> 
> Revised: No
> 
> Hello! I have written a lenghy oneshot with the university-AU, if you are interested in reading more, whilst waiting on updates here. If you want to check it out please visit my profile! :)

The pub wasn’t all that crowded, when Steve got in. But it was still early and he knew by now, how quickly the small establishment filled, once the last classes of the day ended. He spotted his friend in a small booth right next to the bar.

“Hey man”, Sam Wilson was a smooth, friendly guy. Steve met him on his very first day here. The psychology major had been out with another friend of his, Natasha, and rescued Steve who was having a bad asthma attack from a hoard of drunken soccer fans, ready to squish the coughing, skinny blonde guy to get to the front of the tram. Sam just took him by the shoulders and moved him to a safe space, where he insisted on staying with him until the asthma attack was over.

And now here they were, Sam with his red wine, Steve with a light beer – sitting in Sams favorite pub, or as he called it: _Kneipe_. Steve loved how most Americans he stumbled upon in this country, started to casually slip in German words every now and then. He was quite exited to try it out himself, once he felt more comfortable with the language.

“Are you alright?” Steve blinked and realized he had drifted away again. Sam raised one eyebrow and took a sip of his wine. “Boy trouble?”

Steve winced, “hardly. I am just trying really hard not to develop a crush at the moment.”

“Uh”, his friend smirked, “do tell.”

“It’s a little cliché, I know, but I got this stupid-hot TA in one of my classes and we had a really nice talk today.”

“A TA?” Sam belted out into laughter, “damn Rogers, that’s more than a little cliché! Hell, I had a crush on every single one of my TAs so far.”

“Yeah, how did that go for you?” Steve grinned.

“Very well, if you must know. The one in second year even liked me back. That was until she read my final paper for that semester.”

They burst into laughter and Steve waved the waiter over for another beer. “You want more wine?” Sam nodded. When Steve turned around in his seat he froze. Oh shit. Oh shit shit shit shit shit.

At the bar, no more than 10 feet away, sat his damn TA with a beer and two other guys that Steve had seen around the campus.

“Shit, Sam!” He turned around so quickly, he almost hit the waiter.

The psychology student was busy telling the poor guy exactly what kind of red wine he liked and looked disgruntled at Steve, while the waiter left their table. “What is it? You look like you saw a ghost!”

“Worse!” Steve mumbled under his breath, “my TA! He’s sitting right over there at the bar. 6 feet, dark hair, looks kinda like a greek god who slipped right out of a wet dream.”

“Damn Steve, too much information!” Sam snickered and leaned subtly to the left, as to get a good look at the bar. “Oh, I see it now. He really does look like the kind of guy you would dream abo- ouch!” Steve hit his arm.

“Shup up! You think he overheard us? Oh god, I cannot live, if he overheard us. I will jump right in front of the next tram I swear to god.”

“Can you chill?” Sam shook his head, “I don’t think he heard us. He’s with Thompson and Müller, two of the other Lit-TAs, and the music in here is pretty loud.”

He was right. James seemed to be wrapped in a discussion about something and the pop-2000-playlist that played in the background was so loud, Steve could barely understand Sam. But he still wasn’t able to shake the absolute dread and fear of being overheard. He had to survive the next six weeks next to this guy and he could not do that, if James knew about his crush. Hell, Steve might actually have a shot at a friendship with this guy, if nothing went wrong. And he really wanted that.

“Alright, I’m gonna go over there and check out the parameter for you. They know me, I’m sure if they had seen or heard us, one of them would have come over to say hello by now.” Steve nodded and observed, as Sam made his way to the group of men. He had never felt so small in his life, and he had stopped growing when he was fourteen. Sam was greeted by the kind of long, loud “Heeeeey” that could only stem from a slightly drunk group of people who did not give a damn about how obnoxious others might find them. He saw his friend gesture towards him and ducked behind his chair.

What the hell was he doing?

When Steve dared to look again, he saw a row of confused faces and Bucky, smiling his damn smile. That meant he had to get over there, right?

With a deep sigh he lifted himself up and joined them at the bar. Sam grinned like the idiot he was.

“Guys, this is Steve. He’s only been here for two weeks and already got himself in more trouble than I ever thought possible.”

Steve grimaced at him and shook the hands of the two guys he didn’t know yet. Thompson was a very British guy with hair the colour of straw and crooked teeth that made his wide smile even more of a delight than it already was. Müller was from Hamburg and the tallest, skinniest person Steve had ever seen.

“Nice to meet you all!” Steve smiled into the group and found himself somehow staring right into Buckys eyes. The TA had a smirk on his face that Steve would love to see in a different kind of context. No no no Steve! Focus!

“You two already know each other?” Sam played surprised and listened to Bucky telling him the same story Steve had previously told him. Minus the part about Bucky being the ‘stupid-hot TA’, that Steve had a crush on, of course.

“Really, well Steve got real lucky to get a TA like Bucky. I have never seen someone take office hours so seriously before.” Müllers accent complimented his slightly tipsy demeanor, but Bucky laughed it off.

“For him, actually being there when you have to is already too much to ask.”

The group had a good laugh. Then Bucky turned towards to bartender to get himself another beer and Steve took the opportunity to take his own beer and climb the chair next to him.

“So, what happened to getting food and going home?”

The brunet laughed and took a sip of his beer, “well I ran into those two idiots on the tram and two minutes later I was on my way here.”

“Ah, the dangers of peer pressure.” Steve allowed himself a quick glance and caught James’ eye. He looked at Steve with an almost puzzling look. For a terrifying second Steve feared, that Bucky did in fact hear him, and was only waiting for a chance to let him down easy. But nothing of that sort happened. Thankfully, they now were back to beer and light conversation with the rest of the group.

“By the way Buck, you missed Peggy today at the colloquium.” Thompson got himself a fist full of mini pretzels and chewed them loudly.

“Yeah? Her project is coming along nicely I heard.”

Steve felt a little pinch of jealousy somewhere inside of him, but kept on drinking his beer.

“She asked about you!” The Englishman grinned and started a light cheer, which Müller joined, without really having a grasp on what was going on.

“Can you cut it out?” Bucky shook his head playfully and Steve nearly fell off the chair. Oh god. Of course. Of fucking course.

“What is going on?” Sams eyebrows were raised so high, they almost touched his hairline.

“Oh you haven’t heard? They went out!” Thompson wiggled his eyebrows and downed his drink.

Bucky help up his hands in defeat, “we worked on her thesis proposal back in June and went out like twice. Didn’t work out, so we’re just friends now.” He turned to Thompson, “you really need to stop telling people that we’re a thing. I’ve been getting some very bad looks from the guys she went out with since.”

Steve couldn’t feel his face. Bucky was straight. And he went out with Peggy. He wanted to go. Right now. This was all a little much for him. Usually his crushes mellowed out slowly and weren’t smashed to pieces barely five hours after starting by a drunk English guy in a god damn _Kneipe_.

“Steve knows her, maybe he’s the guy you should actually be grilling about all of this.”

What?

He looked up just in time to catch a smirk from Bucky and very, very curious looks from the other guys, apparently waiting for him to explain his relationship with Peggy.

He chuckled nervously, “no, definitely not! We just met this week and she’s not really… my type.”

He wanted to bite his tongue off for that last part. All of this made Steve incredibly uncomfortable. Bucky going out with Peggy, thinking that Steve might be doing that as well, the guys talking about her like that. It all felt so… icky.

“What do you mean by that? She’s so hot!” Müller chimed in with a comment that nearly made Steve punch him in the face. But he was too worn down and even if he tried, he probably wouldn’t reach his face. The guy was a damn tree.

Thankfully, Sam spared him an answer by quickly changing the subject to beer and the drunken TAs all turned to the bar to get more booze. Steve took that chance to say his goodbyes and leave without really being noticed.

“You’re leaving so soon?”

Shit.

Steve had just slipped out, when he heard Buckys voice behind him. It was even colder than before, the sun had completely set by now and the streets were almost empty.

“Yeah, I don’t really feel comfortable with that kind of topic. Also around drunk people in general.” Steve had no idea why he was so blunt all of a sudden; maybe it was his tired little body telling him that he’s had it.

“I understand, sorry for my comment.” Bucky shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other. “I really am sorry.”

Steve took a deep breath, “it’s fine. It wasn’t your fault. I’m just-“ he rubbed his nose bridge searching for the right words, “god, don’t call me out on my bad wording, but I guess sensitive fits it best.”

“Hey, we’ve all had a long day. I think some sleep might mellow it out again.”

Steve laughed, “well, for me at least. Or is the construction zone in front of your house about to drown in Thompsons left over beers?”

Bucky groaned, “don’t remind me.” He took a quick look at his phone and then at the sky, “it’s getting late. Get home safely, will ya?”

Steve nodded, a little overwhelmed by the sudden spurt of niceness, coming from his TA. But then again, he had been friendly earlier today as well.

“Bucky!” Müller stuck his head out of the pub-door and grinned at James. He didn’t really seem to notice Steve.

“I’ll be right in”, James gave Müller a quick wave and turned back to Steve, “hey, you wanna exchange numbers?”

Steve lightly chocked, “yeah sure”, he cleared his throat and handed Bucky his phone.

“’Aight, I put my number in. Text me when your home safe?”

Steve nodded and with that, Bucky was back in the pub and Steve had to sit down for a second. He couldn’t help but smile and no matter what his anxious brain tried telling him, the smile did not stop until he was at home and ready to get into bed. Laying there, scrolling through Twitter, he remembered his promise to Bucky.

Just a quick text that he got home safely. There was nothing too special about that. In fact, he asked a lot of his friends to do that, whenever they parted late at night. Bucky probably already forgot about the whole thing by now.

He opened his contacts to search for Bucky, nothing. James? Also nothing. Confused, Steve started scrolling through all the names in his contact list until his heart skipped a beat. There Bucky was. And he had put himself in the phone as ‘The stupid-hot TA’.


	3. The one with the knock on the door

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one kinda got away from me a little. Sorry it's so long. I hope you enjoy it! :)
> 
> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: A bit  
> \- Other: Strong language, WW2 (mention), Guernica war crimes
> 
> Revised: yes
> 
> Hello! I have written a lenghy oneshot with the university-AU, if you are interested in reading more, whilst waiting on updates here. If you want to check it out please visit my profile! :)

Steve could not believe that he was on his way to that class. All week long he had been debating with himself whether or not he would drop the course and look for a different one. But even then, he would still risk running into Bucky at the university. He had even been thinking about returning back to the US and restart the semester there. Everything, really everything, seemed like a better choice than just returning to the class like nothing ever happened, sitting in the same room as James, wondering if it would be easier to just never talk again. Shutting up for the rest of his life. If he never spoke again, he could never again be overheard and humiliated by that. Seemed like an okay idea.

He took the elevator and took a sharp left. Bucky was standing right in front of the entrance to the library and Steve just could not handle that kind of stress right now. So he waited. In the disgustingly bride, white neon light of the mens bathroom. Every time someone came in he began fumbling with the towel dispenser, trying to look like he was in here doing proper toilet-business, not hiding like the coward he was.

Pathetic.

Exactly 60 seconds after the class was set to start he got out into the now almost empty hall way and sighted in relieve when he saw that the door to the library was free now. He made his way to the room of the seminar, took a deep breath and opened the door.

There was a fatal flaw in his otherwise brilliant plan. Everyone in that room was looking at him. The guy that came in late. Damn. He swallowed hard, ignored Bucky’s look – the guy was smirking again because of fucking course he was, and made his way to the window front. He sat down three tables away from James, as far away as he could, and took out his materials.

Mr. Coulson lightly tapped on his table and cleared his throat. “Now that we’re complete, why don’t we start with something fun? How about”, he smiled, “Picasso’s _Guernica_.” The professor took a look around the room and raised his eyebrows. “Any takers?”

A young woman on the other side of the room raised her hand. “ _Guernica_ is one of Picasso’s most famous paintings, together with _Les Demosielles d’Avingnon_ and some stuff from his blue period. It was painted 1937 as a reaction to the attacks on the Spanish city Guernica via Italian troupes and the German legion _Condor_. It was presented for the first time at the Paris world exposition, the _Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne_ to be precise. Right now, I believe, it’s in a private museum in Madrid.”

Mr. Coulson nodded in approval and clicked to the next slide in his presentation. It showed the famous painting in all it’s… well glory, if you wanna call it that. Steve had never liked Picasso much. The professor nodded again, “yes yes, very good Miss”, he frowned, “I forgot all of your names again. Help me out?”

The woman smiled, “Miss Sánchez, Sir.”

„Ah”, he seemed intrigued, “I see. Judging by your last name and your accent you know the painting better that the rest of the class, I assume?”

She nodded. “I saw it live many times. You don’t get around it when you study art history in Spain.”

Mr. Coulson cleared his throat again, “well then Miss Sánchez, care to elaborate the background of the painting any further?”

“Sure”, she leaned back a little in her chair, “Guernica is located east of Bilbao all the way in the north of Spain. It’s a holy city for the Euskaldunak, or as you probably know them: the Basques. April 1937 it was attacked by the German and Italian air fleet because it was part of the ‘iron belt’, a row of crucial cities and places surrounding Bilbao. The objective of the attack was to kill as many civilians as possible. The German troops also used it as a testing ground for their bombing-planes and developed strategies they would later use in Poland; something that made Guernica and everything that happened there before, during and after the attacks into an important mark in understanding the differences in war-tactics between the First and the Second World War.”

“Thank you”, Mr. Coulson clapped a few times and looked around at the other students. Most of them sat there with an open mouth and big eyes, others were trying to check Wikipedia as discreetly as possible.

“Now, what can you tell me about the painting itself.” Nobody in the room raised their hand. Everyone was suddenly very busy typing notes, checking their literature or staring holes into the floor. Mr. Coulson took it with humor, the Spanish girl had left quite the impression and nobody wanted to follow that. “Mr. Barnes”, the professor had a sheepish grin on his face, as he turned to Bucky, “do you wanna give it a go?”

Steve couldn’t control himself as he glanced over to Bucky. The poor guy looked shocked, but regained his posture and put on a grin as well.

“Mr. Coulson you really understand how to keep me on my feet”, he chuckled and so did the professor, “’aight, so”, Steve observed with marvel how the TA scrunched his eyebrows and looked the painting up and down a few times. “Imma give it a quick rundown, if that’s okay. It clearly uses Christian images in a combination with cubism and a modern, almost minimalistic approach of architecture, which makes it’s composition quite unique but also really hard to analyze. On top of that, it’s gigantic. If I remember correctly it’s around 30 square meters – 300 square feet for all the Americans in the room – or, to make it a little clearer, bigger than the longest wall in this room. It was originally located in the Spanish pavilion of the exhibit, so Picasso had a fixed place to paint, which is never easy. The fact that it is a lot longer than high means, that the ideal use of space warrants a row of motives, rather than a cluster. Picasso used that for his layout and constructed a scene of destruction, where set motives to break down whereas others mingle and thrive in the mess. He pairs figures, that he and the patrons of his art know, like the horse, the bull, the warrior, with ‘real’ ones. The _Pietá_ , the mother with the dead child, the woman searching refuge, the burning woman, the bird, the olive twig and the spear – all of these motives are commonly used in art, just not Picasso’s art. It’s, for lack of better words, a cluster fuck of mess and birth and art and fire. It’s quite impressive.”

Steve had to fight a wave of arousal. Holy shit. The slurry Brooklyn accent was gone the second Bucky started talking smart. He managed to deliver the row of information with a sulky smooth tone and somehow had it in him to pronounce ‘ _Pietá’_ with so much finesse that Steve was deeply ashamed of himself. He had underestimated this guy big time. He knew that Bucky was smart, but to hear him talk like that was better than any kind of dirty talk – and coming from Steve that really meant something.

“Impressive”, Mr. Coulson smiled at James, who was back to his old smirking self, standing up and giving a small bow towards the room. “Anyone else got something?”

A couple of people raised their hands to talk about the use of colour. Steve knew all of that. But he believed that Mr. Coulson was waiting for something else. He raised his hand and waited patiently for his turn.

“Yes, Mr.?”

„Rogers“, Steve cleared his throat and tried very hard not to look in Bucky’s direction. The brunet was looking at him with anticipation, as were the rest of the class members.

“Mr. Rogers, go ahead.”

“I just wanted to throw Picasso’s view on the political role of art into the mix.” Steve looked to Mr. Coulson, who was nodding in encouragement. “This painting started a controversy, or rather restarted it. The political stance of artists, be it painters, writers, musicians or sculptors, has been discussed many times before Picasso and many times since. War and violence have always been a part of art, but how and if the political views of the artist should have any impact on how we see and discuss the piece of art is in question. Picasso said that he, as a person that lives in a world, has to mirror and reflect the world he lives in through his art. With that, he is no longer neutral, but taking a political position in the world itself and within the world of art.”

A few people agreed with him. A tall, dark haired guy raised his hand, “furthermore, Picasso had already agreed on doing the Spanish pavilion for the exhibit, even before the attack. It was always supposed to be a piece of work specifically for that exhibit. He just chose the political context as he saw fit.”

“But is it really his political view, if he got paid to do it?” A woman chimed in and looked at Steve, “I mean sure, it’s chosen by him. But he is representing someone else, in his case a whole country. How much of that is his personal view and how much is exaggerated to fit the bill? We cannot know for sure, where the line between the artist and the person or institution paying the artist is drawn.”

Steve squinted, she was right. To his surprise, Bucky started talking. “I see your point, but I think that we have to make a conscious decision on how to weigh those things in. Do we take Picasso’s own words on this issue over the vague question of his motive? Or do we agree on putting the whole discussion on ice, until we figured out where to draw that line and how?”

“We have to do both”, Steve didn’t bother raising his hand anymore, “we have to question his artistic motives and discuss the painting under both circumstances at the same time. It’s not like there is a right or wrong answer anywhere. It’s a discussion we see in all art.”

Bucky raised his eyebrows, “all art? Really?”

“Yes!”, Steve felt the heat rise up in his cheeks, “all art is political!”

“That’s the point Picasso is making but is he right? If we want to label all art as political then we have to ask the question what art is and figuring that out never really worked so far.”

“We don’t have to end one discussion to start another one, though. Everything done by humans is political, that’s a given. We are all raised within a belief system and no matter how we express ourselves, it is always tainted by that and consequently political. We can argue about the label ‘art’ and how it is defined, also a very political problem by the way, at the same time as we argue about Picasso’s motives and his art. We have to take in every perspective and every combination in order to come close to something we then can call an agreed on theory. Will this theory be invalidated by future discussions? Probably. But that’s the fun of it all, right? We don’t discuss to get to a clear answer, we discuss for the sake of discussion itself and what viewpoints it gives us.”

Bucky grinned and Steve heard him whisper “damn boy” under his breath. He felt weirdly proud of himself and forgot for a moment, that he was supposed to be too embarrassed to talk to James.

“I think it’s time for lunch!” Mr. Coulson hat sat down during the debate and looked very pleased at the discussion he awoke in his students. Steve noticed he was shaking. Too much adrenaline for his tiny body. The professor waited until most of the students had left the room before standing up and making his way over to Steve. This prompted Bucky to leave the room. Something Steve was quite glad about.

“Mr. Rogers, you really have a passion for discussing Picasso.”

Steve shrugged, “to be honest I don’t really care for Picasso. I can acknowledge his talent and the meaning behind his art, but his take on cubism is not my cup of tea.”

His professor laughed and pulled away from Steve’s desk. “Well thank you anyways for your passionate parts of the debate. I really enjoyed it!”

He heard his blood pump in his ears and smiled proudly, what a nice compliment!

Thankfully Bucky did not come back until the break was over. They did not debate anymore after the heated discussion of the morning and Steve could ignore him for the rest of the day. That gave him enough time to develop a game plan on how to quickly get away after class without bumping into Bucky and having to talk to him.

Right after Mr. Coulson told them that the class was over Steve started packing his back and practically ran out of the room straight to a cubicle in the mens bathroom. There he waited and tried his best not to feel too pathetic. He failed.

He was a smart guy, pretty successful at his seminars, always willing to help others out – how did he deserve this torture? A small voice in Steve’s head reminded him, that he was in this embarrassing mess because he had blabbed about his crush in an open space, not checking beforehand, if someone could hear him. He checked the time. It had been five minutes. Surely Bucky was gone by now.

Steve flushed and opened the stall door. He washed his hands and got out of the bathroom, carefully looking around.

“Hey Steve!”

Jesus Christ his heart.

Peggy beamed when he saw him and walked over from her office, which was – together with the other TAs offices – located in a small corner next to the stairway.

“Oh, hey Peggy”, he was actually glad to see her. After the horrors of last Friday, he completely forgot to text her about hanging out, like he promised, and was hoping to make that up to her.

“How was your seminar?” Her British accent made the words stick together, forming one big word: Howsyousemnar. He smiled.

“It was alright. How was your day?”

She frowned, “you don’t want to know. God I hate Fridays. What was up with you last weekend? I thought we wanted to hang out?”

“Yeah”, he scratched the back of his head, “sorry ‘bout that. I had a shitty weekend. You wanna go to the movies tomorrow or something?”

Her face lit up, “yes! Good idea! You pick the movie, no horror or I will kill you, and text me the time?”

He nodded.

“Love it! Gotta go, but I see you tomorrow!” She turned around and made her way to the stairs.

Steve groaned, he could feel the day in his bones. It had been harder to ignore Bucky, than he thought. But at least he didn’t have to talk to him. That would’ve been the end of him.

“Steve?”

Oh fucking hell.

“Hi Bucky”, he knew he was flaring up, “sorry, hey James.”

“Bucky is totally fine!” The brunet’s smile seemed a little unsure for a second, but then he was back to smirking and Steve hated that. What was so funny? He was dying over here and all James could do was smirk.

“Yeah, imma stick with James. Or Mr. Barnes.”

The other man finally dropped the smirk. He almost looked hurt. “Why?”

Steve sighted, he couldn’t believe this was happening, “you know why.”

“Last Friday? Still? Damn man I’m sorry for my behavior. I was lowkey drunk and-“

“Not that. The”, he cleared his throat but his voice was still getting scratchy, “the name thing.”

All of a sudden, James’ smirk was bigger than ever before. “Oh that.”

“Yeah that”, Steve hissed. “I don’t know what’s so funny about that.”

“I mean you gotta admit that it’s at least a little funny.”

Steve’s jaw dropped, “absolutely not! I am so damn embarrassed and you smirking away doesn’t exactly make it better!”

Bucky let out a deep sigh, “’aight, you wanna talk about this? Okay.” He took Steve’s arm and dragged him towards the offices at the other end of the floor.

“What? No!” Steve freed himself from Bucky’s grip and took a step back. He hated being manhandled by people who believed they could do anything with him just because he was small.

“You don’t?” Bucky looked confused and still a little amused, which made Steve furious.

“No! I just want to leave this whole mess behind, survive the next few weeks and then never see you again.” That came out a little harsh but in Steve’s mind Bucky kind of deserved that.

“Well then I wanna talk about it, because that outcome is not good enough for me.” He proceeded to walk towards his office and looked back, waiting for the younger man to follow. Steve could still not believe that this was happening. He looked at his feet, the ceiling, the walls, Bucky – and then he gave in and followed him. The floor was empty by now, only the librarian was sitting next to the entrance of the library and on the lower end of staircase Steve could hear two people talking.

He walked into the corner and looked around. There was the office Peggy was sharing with another TA, the one from Mr. Coulson and the office of another professor, who’s name did not ring a bell, one for three TAs – that had to be a nightmare – and one other office with the names Steffen Müller and James Barnes next to it. Great, Bucky was sharing his office with the drunk German from the bar.

“Why do we have to go to your office?” Steve felt incredibly itchy all of a sudden. He played with the thought of just turning around and running away.

“You wanna talk about this out in the open? I mean that seems to be kind of your thing but I’m usually a little more private about these matters.”

Steve’s ears were so hot, he felt the heat radiate towards the rest of his face. “Fine, get in then.”

Bucky closed the door behind them and turned around to Steve, who was checking out the bookshelf in the corner of the small room. Two desks stood at opposite walls. One with a laptop on it, one with a computer screen, both covered in books, coffee cups and loose paper.

“Sit”, Bucky said and seated himself in one of the office chairs. Steve reluctantly took the other one. Judging by the two loose beer bottles next to him he was sitting at Müllers desk.

“So”, Bucky looked at him with a sheepish kind of anticipation, “you got a crush on me huh?” He grinned.

“Oh fuck this”, Steve was ready to leave but Bucky was faster.

“Sorry, sorry. That one’s on me. Also sorry for putting my name in your phone like that. That was an admittedly childish attempt at humor.”

“God”, Steve laid his head back, “I hate this so much. You were never supposed to hear all that. I was just fucking around with Sam and”, he buried his face in his hands, not seeing how Bucky’s expression went darker for a second, “then I sat there for like an hour talking to you not knowing what a giant idiot I was.”

“You really need to chill, man. I was the only one who overheard. The other guys had no idea. And I was only fucking with you because I wanted to signal you that we are cool.”

Steve looked up, “we really are? Because I swear to you that it was a spur of the moment thing.” Oh the lies he told. His mother would so not approve. “I mean you know how you look and I’d only just met you that day, so I was-“

Bucky cut him off, “I get it.” He looked a little hurt, but covered it up with a smirk right away, “I am well aware of the effect I have on people.”

Steve rolled his eyes, “you make it real easy to get over you, though.”

They laughed and Steve felt a million times better. Bucky was right, talking about it made things way easier. Lost in his thought he noticed how Bucky’s eyes seemed to flicker up and down Steve’s body just for half a second. He shook his head. These kinds of thoughts really needed to stop now.

“Okay, so am I being held hostage in this sad excuse of a room or can I leave? I still gotta get some groceries for the weekend.” Steve grinned.

“You are free to leave, but only if you make the time to hang out soon.” Bucky gave Steve one of those kind of smiles that got him into the mess the first place and Steve tried really hard not to melt on the spot.

“Yeah”, he gave himself a second to collect all of his thoughts and stuff them in the back of his brain, “I think I can squeeze you in.” Bad wording, but thankfully Bucky did not seem to notice. The older guy seemed to be in thought as he stood up and walked to the door with Steve right in his back. But he didn’t open it. Instead, he turned around with a new kind of expression.

Steve swallowed dry as he saw the dark eyes, lightly parted lips – it was a thinking face. And it was not hard to imagine what Bucky was thinking about.

What the hell was going on? Did he miss something? He must have missed something! How did this go from a ‘let’s be friends’-moment to a look best described as a ‘let’s make this room into a bedroom’-look.

“Bucky?” Steve whispered, looking up innocently with his big blue eyes.

“Steve.” Bucky’s voice was husky and raw. It scraped over Steve’s skin in the best kind of way. “I am in a little bit of a conflict here, because I have to let you out of this room now but I kinda don’t want to.”

Alright, Steve thought, so he was either outing himself as a serial killer or – Steve swallowed again.

“Why not?” Steve rolled the dice on the whole serial killer thing. Hell, the way Bucky looked right now, he probably wouldn’t even object to being murdered by him. That was really not a healthy thought, but he decided to further investigate this bit later.

“See”, Bucky licked his lower lip and nearly send Steve to his knees with that (not that Steve would mind), “last Friday when I overheard you, I thought it would be a good idea to flirt with you and tease you a little bit.” Steve shivered, Bucky flirted? Damn, he really needed to learn to pick things like that up. “And then I realized how bad of an idea that was”, Steve bit his lip in disappointment, but Bucky wasn’t finished. “Because I’m your TA and I could get fired, you could get kicked out of the exchange program”, he took a little step towards Steve, who was close to fainting, “but now that we settled on being friends, I’m feeling kinda twisted. Because that means that you stop having a crush on me and to be honest that would just feel like a terrible waste to me. Also this whole situation is just so… hot.”

Oh god. What was happening? Steve wanted to open his mouth, say something, anything really. But all he could do was stand there and stare into Bucky’s eyes. The sun had almost completely set and left them both in the kind of darkness that made sharp lines disappear and everything kind of blurry. Bucky was right, this was a bad idea. A really bad one. But damn Bucky liked him back and how unfair was a world, where this guy was actually attracted to him, but they couldn’t act on it.

A knock on the door had both of them snap back into reality and realize where they were. In a TAs office in a university that would kick them both out, if they did anything beyond this part. Bucky looked at the door as if he’d never seen one before. When he turned his head back to Steve, the smaller one looked at him and allowed himself a tiny look at Bucky’s mouth that was still partially open. When he got back to his eyes, they were filled with a kind of hunger Steve had never seen nor felt – until this very moment.

A second passed that felt like a year and then Bucky lowered his head to Steve’s level and kissed him. It was a sinful kiss that made Steve’s ears ring. He felt Bucky’s tongue slide into his mouth and his hot breath and – there was still someone knocking.

“Buck?” Steve recognized the slight German accent, it was Müller. “Bucky, I need a book and my key’s at home. Are you in there?”

Steve held his breath, which was quite hard whilst kissing, hoping Müller wasn’t intelligent enough to try opening the unlocked door. He was in luck, after a few moments he heard a sigh and then footsteps.

His eyes met Bucky’s, who seemed to smirk even when they were kissing, what the hell was wrong with this guy?

“That was close”, Steve took a breathing-break and leaned against the bookshelve.

“I know.” The dark tone in Bucky’s voice drove Steve almost mad. This little shit got off on the fact, that they almost got caught. It was ridiculous and extremely hot. Steve wrapped his hands around Bucky’s neck and starting kissing his neck. He in turn laughed hoarsely and lifted Steve up – carefully – until he was able to wrap his legs around Bucky’s torso. With a swift motion James turned and pressed Steve against the door, legs in the air, completely at Bucky’s mercy.

If someone were to open the door now, they would both drop to the ground. But more importantly, he was kissing someone who could cost him everything. If someone heard them, saw them get in there earlier and put together the pieces, Steve could get kicked out. He could lose his scholarship, a full semester of credits, maybe even his place back home. In any scenario, it would taint his academic reputation for ever, probably to a point, where Steve would never be able to think about a career in the academic field or even write a dissertation. Was he really risking it all for a hot make-out-session right now?

He felt Bucky’s body pressed against him, discovered his muscles with his hands, scratched over his back, felt every muscle and every twitching nerve, smelled his scent, heard his hot little moans in his ear, every time Steve brushed over a nipple.

Hell yeah he was. This was worth it.

Somehow he found Bucky’s face and bit down on his obscenely swollen lower lip, making the TA release a sound that Steve was very happy about, but that was also a little too loud.

“Shhh”, he grinned. “You’re gonna get us caught.”

James shifted Steve’s position a little and all of a sudden Steve felt how hard the other man was. Shit, he hadn’t even thought about that so far, but now that he did, he realized that he was just as turned on. Bucky began slowly grinding his hips against Steve’s. A move that made Steve release the tiniest little scream.

Now it was Bucky’s turn to shush him. He had that smirk on his face again and by god it drove Steve crazy.

Another knock made both of them freeze in fear.

Shit shit shit shit.

They we’re still leaning against the door, both rock hard, sweaty with swollen, purple lips and messy hair. It was hot as fuck, but also terrifying.

“Mr. Barnes?”

That was Mr. Coulson. Panic rushed over them, as they quickly parted, Steve fixing his clothes, getting to a chair, hiding his damn boner whilst sitting down and taking out a folder from his backpack. Bucky put on the main light, which made them both groan, combed through his messy hair and sat down on the other chair with his legs crossed.

“Mr. Coulson? I am with a student.” His voice was a little shaky but otherwise back to normal, which Steve found almost sad.

The professor took that as a signal to open the door and looked a little bewildered at the TA with the messy hair and the student who had a frozen smile on his face. “Ah, Mr. Rogers. Are you two talking about the class?”

“Yes”, Steve had gotten himself together again and smiled, this time more naturally, “I coerced Mr. Barnes here to talk about my thesis for this course. I wanna get started on that as soon as possible. We were actually just finishing up.” He felt Bucky’s eyes on him.

“Oh Mr. Rogers you should probably also come see me about that, but I am glad about your enthusiasm! Picasso it is?”

“Sure”, Steve grid his teeth. Great, now he had to write about Picasso.

“Well Mr. Barnes, I was just about to ask you about your project but since you are busy, let’s do it tomorrow.” He turned around and gave them a little wave as he closed the door behind him.

Both men immediately sunk into their chairs and let out sighs.

“That was way too close.” Steve felt like he had no bone left in his body.

“Yeah, good save though.” Bucky grinned tiredly.

“If my ma knew that I was that good a liar, she would kick my ass so hard.”

They laughed and stared around the room for a little while.

“So you wanna go back to my place or is this a university-only kind of situation?” The blonde snickered at his own joke and let out a small yawn.

“I’d love to, but are you sure? I don’t just”, she shifted uncomfortably in his chair, “I don’t just want this to be like a hook-up or something.”

Steve had to laugh at that, “oh no, remember that we’re not supposed to hook up? I am only saying that as a friend of course.”

“Ah of course”, Bucky smiled one of his wonderful smiles and Steve suppressed a giggle.

“Also”, Steve packed the folder back into his bag, “you got that construction zone out front and what kind of person would let their friend suffer trough that?” He innocently batted his eyes at Bucky and loved the way it made the older man hold his breath.

Bucky stood up and stretched, “well then friend, lead the way!”


	4. The one where Steve is an idiot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: No  
> \- Other: Strong language
> 
> Revised: no
> 
> Hello! I have written a lenghy oneshot with the university-AU, if you are interested in reading more, whilst waiting on updates here. If you want to check it out please visit my profile! :)

The tram ride through the town was – for lack of better wording – weird. Steve found himself wanting to cuddle up to Bucky, or lean in at least. He was tired and wanted to be near this man, wanted to tuck at his brown curls and whisper and laugh – but that was not going to happen, was it? Because someone could see them.

_I don’t just want this to be like a hook-up or something._

These words made Steve tingle. Bucky had looked so vulnerable, when he said that. And now they were sitting quietly next to each other off to Steve’s flat to do – ehm, what exactly? Have sex? Steve held back a cough. Why did that scare him so much? Not like he was new to this. It was just weird, how everything had fallen into place. They saw each other, Steve accidentally confessed his crush on him, they kissed. It was too good, to be real.

Was he just fucked up?

When they got out and walked the silent, dark street, Bucky shuffled closer to Steve. It made Steve’s thoughts shut up for a minute. It was still quite surreal, when Steve opened the door to his apartment to let Bucky inside. It was a small unit, just enough space for his bed, a desk, a small kitchen and his bathroom. Right next to his bed was a large window and a door to his balcony. It wasn’t much, but Steve really loved it. Despite the fact that it was crazy expensive, but he tried not thinking about that too much.

“So”, Bucky stood awkwardly in between the desk and the bed, “it’s small.” Well at least Steve wasn’t the only one who felt awkward.

“Yeah it is, but I bet your first place here wasn’t much bigger.” Steve smiled and walked towards the kitchen isle. He needed tea. It was still ridiculously cold outside, and he felt like an ice pick.

“True.” The brunet sat down at the foot of the bed and looked around. “I had less stuff though. Made the room too stuffy for me. But I like the way you arranged everything. Looks cozy.”

“What, you some kind of minimalist?” Steve grinned at the thought and turned around to face the brunet. “I could never live without my books and”, he glanced over his walls, they were full of art and posters, “a personal touch. Can’t stand rooms that look cold.”

Bucky shrugged, “I can’t really breathe when a room is too crowded.”

They sat in silence while Steve’s teakettle started making cooking-noises.

“This is weird, why is this weird?” Bucky sounded frustrated. “It was hot 30 minutes ago!” He pouted and Steve looked at his face with marvel. Even when he pouted, he was ridiculously pretty. It also made him feel a thousand times better. Bucky was thinking about the same stuff, as he was. That was good – right?

“Hm”, Steve forced himself back to reality. He suddenly felt very tired. “Probably because nobody here can catch us. I’m not too worried though. I would still climb you like a coconut tree right now, but I am way too tired for a workout.”

It was the first time he heard Bucky laugh. Real, deep, throaty, long-ass laughter that made him slap his knee. It was glorious – and a lie, sadly. What if it really only was hot, when they were in Buckys office? What if this only worked, because there was a thrill, not because they actually liked each other.

Shit. Rogers! Don’t overthink! You think he’s hot. He – hopefully – thinks you are hot. This is just a weird situation. It will straighten itself out!

“You want a cup?” Steve gestured towards the teapot, half expecting Bucky to say no, but to his surprise the brunet nodded, still somewhat chuckling. He poured two cups of tea and climbed his way over to the other side of the bed.

Bucky took his mug with a sly thank you-look that involved his typical smirk and leaned back a bit on the bed. “Gotta say, I am very thankful for your offer to sleep here. Even if you won’t”, he started laughing again, “climb me like a – what was it? Coconut tree?”

Steve shot him a mean look, but he couldn’t stop himself from smiling. Yeah. They were gonna be just fine. “If you keep running that smart mouth of yours, you will never see, what I mean with that and believe me, you’ll want to see that.”

“Oh I would never question that.” Bucky grinned, “so? Sleep?”

“Yeah!” Steve groaned and plucked a tablet from his nightstand, “you wanna look for something to watch?”

“Jesus”, Bucky took the tablet, “it’s not even 11pm and I am more than ready for bed. I am getting old.”

“Yeah you are ancient and disgusting and also would you mind turning off the lights?” Steve said sarcastically, already snuggling himself into his blankets with his mug pressed against his chest.

“Punk”, Bucky muttered under his breath.

“What was that?” Steve gazed over with a hint of murder in his eyes.

“Oh nothing”, Bucky replied, a smirk plastered on his face, as he turned off the lights.

The morning came with a very heavy arm wrapped around Steve and the sound of a phone buzzing almost aggressively against the mattress. Steve groaned and tried freeing himself enough to get to his phone, which was stuck somewhere under his pillow. Of course, he had to develop a crush on someone who just happened to look like a damn GQ model. What seemed so endearing yesterday, when Bucky was able to lift Steve up like it was nothing, unraveled itself to be a death trap now. The muscular arms were so damn heavy. Steve leaned back a little and was able to fetch the phone just as it stopped vibrating. Damn it. He looked at the lock screen – a photo of his late family dog – and cursed loud enough to cause the man next to him shift, but Steve didn’t care anymore.

He had forgotten about Peggy.

Fucking hell.

She was standing outside. Fuck fuck fuck. It just now dawned on him, that Bucky and Peggy went out. They not only knew each other, they WENT OUT. Like on dates. Not many, but still. Probably nothing happened. God he hoped nothing happened, but he should’ve talked to Peggy beforehand nonetheless.

“Bucky”, Steve hissed towards the sleeping mess next to him, not allowing himself to marvel at how cute of a mess it was. “Bucky get up, Peggy is here.”

That worked.

Within seconds the other man was wide awake, looking alarmed in Steve’s direction. “What?” He blinked, “I repeat: What!?”

“I forgot that we sorta were supposed to hang out today, well tonight – we were supposed to catch a movie, but she’s here, and she brought breakfast and you gotta leave!”

Steve panted, halfway into a sweater, realizing that he was putting in on the wrong way around. Fuck.

“I gotta go? Steve we are on the fifth floor how the hell am I supposed to get out without her seeing me?”

“You have to get out the door and wait beh-“ Steve’s plan got washed away as they heard a knock on the door.

“Oh not again”, Bucky sighted. He was right, this was now the third time this happened to them and it was getting rather stressful.

“We could just explain to her that you slept over because of some reason that I still have to think of.” Steve rubbed his face and closed his eyes.

Bucky collected his clothes and headed for the bathroom. “Yeah, well she is expecting you to open the door, so I’m choosing the bathroom.”

Steve looked to the door, looked over to Bucky, already halfway through the bathroom door, and just sat down. “I’ll be there in a sec Peggy”, he called out, “just getting dressed.”

He gave himself another second before he stood up, got into a pair of pants, lazily made the bed, strolled over to the front door and opened it, giving Peggy an apologetic grin.

“Hey”, she looked suspicious, cocking one eyebrow.

“I brought breakfast.” She repeated the info she’s already given in her texts. “I hope you don’t mind”, she stepped into the room, looking around, “that I just came over”, her eyes narrowed, as though she was analyzing something, “this soon. But after you blew me off last weekend, I kinda don’t care because you deserve it.”

“Are you finished looking like you gonna bust me for leaving a sock on the floor?” Steve grinned halfheartedly.

“I don’t know if I am”, Peggy replied, “you took awfully long to open the door and I heard whispers. You alone?”

“Yeah, I was on the phone”, Steve lied, “I had to call my mom.”

“Right”, she nodded, “so I woke you up by calling and then you decided to call your mom. Sounds legit.” A knowing smile formed on her face.

“It’s her birthday.” Steve mentally cursed himself for lying about something like that. “So yeah, I called her.”

Peggy still had one eyebrow cocked, but she shrugged and stopped her interrogation. “So, bagel?”

It took Steve 20 minutes to get everything out for breakfast, eat half a bagel and hold a conversation long enough, to decide, that he could make a run to the bathroom.

“Be right back”, he said as innocently, as possible, and headed to the door.

In the bathroom, he was met with a bored looking Bucky, sitting on the closed toilet lid, playing on his phone. “Just how long will I be your prisoner?” The brunet whispered, smirking at his phone.

“I don’t know, I am so sorry.” Steve leaned on the sink and sighted. “Maybe I can convince her to go outside for a bit? Then you could sneak out. God”, he looked at himself in the mirror, “look at us. ‘Sneak out’ like we’re fucking teenagers.”

Bucky appeared behind him, “yeah”, his voice was raspy and dark, “kinda hot.”

“Oh you fucker”, Steve had to grin, “something is seriously messed up with you to think that this is anything but utterly ridiculous and- oh” he felt a hand slide down his back, lightly pressing against the small of his back, slowly making it’s way around his waist and into his pants.

He could not get out there again with a hard on. That was not happening.

Steve hated himself for pushing Bucky away, playfully, but still. “I am going out there again now. You sit an”, he smirked, “think about this.”

Bucky leaned in, his hot breath on Steve’s neck, “oh I will.”

Peggy was waiting patiently outside, texting someone on her phone. She looked up at Steve, who just now realized, that he had spent an embarrassingly long amount of time in the bathroom. Well, this was shaping out to be a really weird day. He decided to just go for it. He had to tell her anyways, might as well do it now.

“So Peggy”, he sat down and tried ignoring her gaze, “I wanted to talk to you about something. You know B- James Barnes? He’s in your program.”

She looked confused, but happy. “Yeah”, she gleamed, “he helped me out a lot a couple months ago. Couldn’t have written my thesis proposal without him. Why?”

“He’s my TA and I”, he knew that Bucky was listening but what the hell, “I kinda got a crush on him. Some guy in your program told me you kinda dated for a while, I just w-“

She silenced him with a swift hand gesture. “We went out twice, nothing happened, we’re friends. You have my blessing to crush on him all you want.” She grinned and Steve looked at the floor.

“Yeah uhm about that, so-“

“He’s in the bathroom isn’t he.”

Steve bit his lower lip and observed, as she made her way towards the bathroom door. “James? That you?”

“Uhhh, yep”, he sounded defeated, “it’s me. Hiding in a bathroom, like the very mature 28-year-old that I apparently am.”

She grinned, “you dressed?”

“Yeah.”

“Then get out already.”

They heard a thump behind the door, before it opened, revealing a very apologetic looking Bucky. Peggy leaned against the door frame and looked over to Steve.

“We are not gonna see a movie today, are we?”


	5. The one where nothing happens

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: Kinda  
> \- Other: Strong language
> 
> Revised: No
> 
> Hello! I have written a lenghy oneshot with the university-AU, if you are interested in reading more, whilst waiting on updates here. If you want to check it out please visit my profile! :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for my absence, it's the time of year, when university eats up all my time. Here is a small chapter where nothing really happens apart from some light smut, a little joking around and some quality time with the boys. Enjoy!

Steve didn’t see Bucky for a full week afterwards. They tried making plans, but it never worked. He saw Peggy plenty, though, so there was that. Even though Peggy had transformed into a very mean person. She went out for drinks with him and brought Natasha along, someone Steve only knew over Sam. Turned out, she’s best friends with Bucky and Steve was in _misery_.

When he stumbled into class next Friday, he was genuinely shocked, seeing the other man sitting there like half of his friends weren’t starting a betting pool on when they were gonna hook up.

Steve had no idea, how to cope.

So, he just sat down next to Bucky and mumbled a hush “g’mornin”.

“Well good morning there, sunshine”, Bucky had the audacity to grin.

 _Bastard_.

Steve tried very hard to look, like he was mad. “You have terrible friends.”

“Oh, I know”, he was still grinning, and dear lord did it look _good_. “They are just playing, though. Don’t think too much about it.”

“They do that every time you”, Steve paused, ‘you’re trapped in a bathroom of someone you made out with a bunch of times?’ Nah. He sighed, “well, you know.”

“No, they don’t.” He chewed his chewing gum for a few seconds and looked way to obscene doing it.

“Guess I’m special then.” Steve cringed at himself, why did he sound so needy all the time?

But Bucky’s grin just grew bigger. His eyes were glued to their professor, who was just now coming into the room, as he leaned over to Steve to whisper, “guess you are.”

At least the sexual tension wasn’t gone. Steve had worried a lot about that, after all the weird stuff that had happened over the last few weeks. But apparently Bucky had transformed into a horny teenager and well, albeit Steve had a couple moments where he almost chocked on a text message the other man sent him, innocently sitting at his laptop just a few feet away, he really couldn’t complain.

He was in the middle of discussing something about the artworks on the berlin wall, when Steve got another message.

I miss that cute lil blush that u get when you’re hard. ;)

Steve bit his lower lip and hid his phone in his lap, as he looked over to Bucky and – un- _fucking_ -believable. There he was. Sitting with a stern look, laptop open in front of him, but his gaze fixated on Coulson, nodding and taking part in the discussion. Like, actually taking part. Saying stuff, agreeing with others, fucking looking into the room like he didn’t just send something very inappropriate to Steve.

All whilst Steve shifted uncomfortably in his seat, trying not to do the very thing, Bucky wanted. Become hot and bothered in the middle of class, whilst being surrounded by students and a professor who – if they got caught – could very well end both their careers.

Bucky really had a knack for danger and goddamn so did Steve.

What a great time to figure out another kink, he thought, suppressing his growing erection.

Lunchtime arrived and Steve stayed back a couple of minutes, until he had himself under control again. Bucky talked to Coulson and turned to Steve, when the professor left.

“You alright there, lil guy?” He was _smirking_.

“I hate you”, Steve hissed, glad that he was able to stand again without it being embarrassing.

“Sure you do”, Bucky’s eyes wandered over Steve’s body and when he met his eyes again, both men were flushed. At least Steve wasn’t the only one affected.

Bucky held the door open and Steve felt his eyes on his ass, as he was leaving the room. _This fucking guy._ He smiled a small, festive smile, as he noticed Bucky heading towards his office. _Very nice_.

They slipped into the – thankfully empty – office and withing seconds Bucky had Steve pressed against the door like the first time they made out here – Steve tried very hard to ignore the memories of Coulson almost catching them and that one German guy as well and Peggy, well actually catching them. They sure had a bad track record when it came to doing this.

But then Bucky’s hand slipped into Steve’s pants and he forgot all about it.

He released a row of little moans into their kiss and Bucky responded. Boy did he respond. His eyes opened, as he pulled back from their kiss looking at Steve like he was a damn world wonder.

Steve, of course, was blushing again.

The other man crashed back into the kiss, still working Steve until the blonde had to stop him because otherwise, he would come. Bucky did not stop. That was what he wanted. Steve wanted to be angry, but it felt really good and hooking up in an office had – after all – a certain time limit.

He tapped Bucky’s shoulder lightly, signalizing that he was almost there, and _the absolute fucker_ nodded and slid down to Steve’s mid-region, pulling the pants down, putting his mouth on Steve, like it was nothing.

When Steve finished, he crashed against the door – softly enough to not alert the people outside (there were _people outside_ , what was he _doing_??). Bucky dove back up, giving the blonde a bitter, deep kiss that made him almost loose his footing again.

“You look just about done”, he remarked, shuffling through his hair. Bucky looked just like before, the skin around his nose was just half a shade redder than usual and he had plump, slightly wet lips.

Steve on the other hand…

“And whose fault is that?” He wanted to hiss, but it came out more like an angry whisper.

“Still got 20 minutes, wanna take a nap?” Bucky pointed towards the small little sofa, he’d crammed in between the bookshelf and one of the desks.

For a heartbeat, Steve considered it. But then he shook his head, “gotta get cleaned up.” He groaned and tried fixing his clothes. Bucky had somehow managed to rip off a button from his shirt. “You guys got a bathroom, or do I have to cross the floor like this?”

Bucky chuckled and dove behind his desk, “I got you.” He held a small box with deodorant, a toothbrush, hand sanitizer, wet wipes and some other stuff, Steve couldn’t make out, in his direction.

“You hook up in here so much you got a kit for it?” Steve raised his eyebrows and grinned, but inside he felt a sting at the thought.

Bucky looked outright offended, “That’s my overnight-kit, for when I got to stay here. Just for that comment”, he pulled the box back, “you don’t get to use it.”

“No!” Steve laughed and tried wrestling the box out of the other man’s hands. They were interrupted by Natasha coming into the office, looking not a single bit shocked. Her gaze went over the room, Bucky’s hair and pink lips, Steve’s blush and half-unbuttoned shirt, both in the middle of fighting for a little metal box. She shook her head and left the room again.

Steve took the element of surprise and got the kit out of Bucky’s hands.

“Man”, the other said, “I really gotta start locking that door.”

“Or, you know”, Steve rummaged through the kit until he had everything he needed to fix himself up, the button was off, but the rest would be fine, “we could just hook up at home, like other illegal couples.”

“Boring”, Bucky popped in another piece of chewing gum and grinned. “Natasha just texted me, wonder what she wants.”

“We can say sorry another time, Buck.” Steve took a look at his wristwatch, “class starts again in five.”


	6. The one with the big questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: No  
> \- Other: Strong language
> 
> Revised: No  
> Sorry for my absence! I work in retail part time and things have been weird and stressful for a couple of weeks. I will update tomorrow again, so I won't leave you with this ending for long!
> 
> Stay inside and keep yourselves save please.

Steve sat in Mr. Coulsons office and stared at the wall to his left. There, Coulson had put up praises and references of his work. Steve felt very small in the leather chair, that stood right in front of a huge desk. His professor looked at the laptop in front of him and smiled a timid smile.

“So, Mr. Rogers. Picasso!” He exclaimed the last part and Steve hated absolutely everything.

“Yeah”, he forced a grin.

“I thought you weren’t keen to his art, may I ask what changed your mind?” Coulson looked at him with full interest and Steve felt himself sweat.

“Uhm”, he had rehearsed this at home, “well you know, I thought about the question of ‘what art is’ in class and how Picasso first evolved his traditional skills before venturing into cubism. It evokes the question we ask often about modern art that, to some of us, makes little to no sense. How skilled artist create perfectly detailed copies of life and get less money and fame than the artists that do more minimalist art. I personally don’t like Picasso, but I recognize art in every way, don’t get me wrong. So, I thought his journey from realism to cubism would be a good starting point of reviewing that discussion.”

“Interesting”, Coulson nodded in approval. “I like the way you connect these topics, but you should be careful not to venture into ‘what art is’ and instead focus more on the way we perceive art and how our current society values a very specific kind of art.”

Steve took some notes on the notebook he cradled in his lap and smiled. “Yes, I do have a tendency to let my projects get out of hand.”

“I have no doubt you will rise to the challenge of discussing these big questions in a way that fits the outlines of your thesis. Especially since Mr. Barnes is helping you out already. He’s doing rather good.” He looked terribly pleased with himself and Steve smiled at how proud of Bucky he seemed to be.

“Yeah, he’s great.” Steve smiled and hoped his ears weren’t going red.

Coulson continued to give Steve feedback on the literature he’d chosen so far and then let him off with the promise to check in on him if he needed help or had a general question. Steve assured him, that he would be in touch about the paper and shook his hand, his heart beating way to fast.

Why was he like this? Every time he had to talk to a professor in an office, his brain shut of and his body panicked. Even with someone as calm as Coulson. All is well, he reminded himself.

Outside Steve took a couple of deep breaths and was finally halfway on his way to a normal heartbeat, when he heard someone call out his name. It was Natasha, who was making a beeline through the crowded floor in his direction.

“Hey Nat”, he smiled and waited for her to get to him. “Whatcha doing?”

She grinned, “just finished off with my office hours and wanted to head out, you down for some dinner?”

Steve took a look at his watch and groaned, “why is it already 5pm?”

“Because we are idiots who thought a career in higher education would be a good idea?” Natasha laughed and started walking towards the stairs with Steve right behind her.

“Speak for yourself, woman.” He joked and was met with a quick glance.

“Oh yeah, I forgot you’re still an undergrad. But Peggy told me you we’re thinking about joining us once you’re done.”

Steve shrugged, “I’m thinking about it, yeah. But honestly I don’t know. It’s a lot of stress for a job that is constantly unsafe, always changing with pending financial struggles left and right.”

Natasha was silent at that for a couple of seconds, “yeah, it’s not great right now. But if you love what you do, you still do it. Despite the shitty circumstances. Plus, I’m done in like a year and already have a three-year-contract for a job here as an assistant professor, so I would be your boss and that would be super cool.”

“Natasha, don’t take this the wrong way but I never ever wanna work for you”, he grinned at Nats barking laughter.

“Where are we going?”, he asked as they got to the end of the stairs and walking towards the east exit.

“Checkers”, she let out a sigh, “I need fried food.”

“You’ve had a day, huh?” Steve grinned again and followed his new friend to the small restaurant and bar right in front of the building.

“You don’t know the half of it”, she trew her hands in the air in frustration, catching looks from strangers around them, but Nat did not care about such things. Steve admired her for that. “There’s this guy whose been putting off writing a paper for two full semesters and now he’s stressing because it’s his last year, and he needs to do it for the credits and now he’s in one of my classes, and he's just not putting in the work. I mean I get it dude but pull it together!”

Steve bit his lip, “just to play devils advocate here, did you ask him why he didn’t finish this sooner? Maybe he’s got depression or something like that.”

Natasha slowed down and for a hot second, Steve thought that he’d royally fucked up. But when he looked up, she was smiling a very kind smile.

“I didn’t ask him about that, you’re right. I am no one to judge like that. I was just frustrated. Sorry I let it out like that.”

“I get it”, Steve shrugged, “had the same problem with my bachelors thesis and my advisor probably hated me for it. Made it a lot harder than t needed to be on the both of us, but my brain was just not having it that semester.”

The woman beside him opened the glass door to the restaurant and followed him in, choosing a table right next to one of the tall windows facing the street.

“Hey, maybe, if you wanted to, you could give me some pointers on how to ask him about that kinda stuff and how to help properly?”

Steve was surprised on how shy Natasha had gotten all of a sudden. She obviously had a hard time finding the right words and Steve appreciated, how she didn’t want to step on any of his toes. He nodded and the woman across the table relaxed visibly.

“Sure, I’d love to. I think it’s great that you are trying to help him.”

“I get why Barnes likes you”, she said and Steve felt the heat in his face from the compliment. It was Thursday, and he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t excited for class tomorrow. Or more precisely, the time after class. He made plans with Bucky and had been giddy about it all week.

“He’s incredible”, Steve finally said and smiled. “I mean, sure he’s hot, but the way he talks about modern art makes me feel all kind of ways.”

Natasha, who was studying her menu, looked up to meet his eyes and blinked. “Oh he’s smart alright. But no where near my levels. Just so we’re clear.”

He laughed way to hard at that. “Sure thing Nat, if you had been my TA I’m sure I’d been swooning all over you.”

“You sure would”, she averted her eyes back down with a serious tone, but that little smile in the corner of her mouth gave away that she was biting back laughter.

“Now. Shall we eat?” Steve already waved the waiter over, not waiting for Natasha’s excited and hungry sounding approval.

*

“Hello everybody”, Mr. Coulson came into the room looking chipper as always. The room was filled with tired, grumbling students who did not appreciate the motivation their professor had this early in the morning.

Steve sat one desk over from Bucky’s usual desk. The other man was still missing. He gave Coulson a slight smile and tried not to look over to the door too much. Bucky was gonna come. He was sure of it.

But then one hour passed, and another. Lunch came and passed by and then it was the evening and Bucky still hadn’t shown up. Horror stories of someone finding out, Bucky taking the blame and getting kicked out creeped up in Steve’s mind, but he tried keeping his anxious brain silent.

It was probably nothing anyways.

He still texted Bucky, Nat and Peggy about it, but Bucky didn’t respond and the other two had no idea where he was. Nat wrote around 3pm that he wasn’t in his office and Peggy confirmed, that he wasn’t texting her back either.

As he pulled on his jacked it struck him, that he didn’t even know where Bucky lived, so he could check in on him. Tired and a little sad he got out of the room, clutching his bag tightly, looking around if maybe the other man was waiting outside for him, but of course he wasn’t. So Steve made his way home, to work on his paper and think about other big questions for a change.


	7. The one with the sad playlist

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: No  
> \- Other: Strong language
> 
> Revised: no

Saturday came and Steve was miserable. Time seemed to crawl, and he wished for nothing more than the weekend to be over so that he at least had something else to do than mope around and feel sorry for himself. It just didn’t add up. Everything was falling into place so easily with Bucky and now the man was not only ghosting Steve but his closest friends. Something was wrong and he had no way of figuring out what.

It ate him alive.

Steve tried drawing and ended up almost snapping a 14 dollar pencil; he tried binge watching his favorite horror movies but couldn’t even bare to pay attention for more than 10 minutes and instead ended up making a very sad playlist to sulk to; he even tried baking a cake which resulted in almost burning down his building.

As he stood upon a chair with an umbrella in his hands, trying to turn the damn smoke alarm of, he realized that he was being pathetic. Hell, was he really throwing himself a pity party all because a guy he made out with a bunch of times didn’t text him back? Sure, the situation was weird, but Nat probably had it covered and Steve had other shit to do.

He sat down with his laptop, staring out the window wondering when it had gotten dark again. The rough draft in front of him made even less sense, than it had yesterday evening. Steve was in over his head with this program. Not only did the university library feature a shit ton of books on Picasso only in German, Italian, Spanish and French – all languages he did not speak, even the online materials were somehow never translated. Things had been easier in the States. He tried to keep the existential crisis bubbling up in him to a minimum and focused on the few materials he had. There was a pretty good book by a Spanish Researcher who’d thankfully wrote it in English and a British documentary on Picasso as a political figure.

Three hours later he had two pages he didn’t hate and felt a little more happy with himself. He tried texting Nat again and to his surprise the red head called him instantaneously. Natasha hated talking on the phone more than anyone, so Steve half-expected that something bad had happened.

“Hey, everything ok with you?”, he asked carefully.

“Yes, I’m fine, I’m fine. Sam’s here by the way.” Steve heard Sam cheer loudly in the background had smiled for the first time today.

“Why are you calling me?” He made his way to the kitchen isle and opened his cabins to look for something to eat.

“Wanted to ask if you’ve heard from Bucky but I’m guessing no since you answered without leaving enough of a break for him to hide in the bathroom.”

He sighed, “Jesus Nat, no I haven’t heard from him at all. You’re not worried, though?”

“Nah”, she dragged the word out, “he does that sometimes. I’ve asked a few times but he never gave me a straight answer so I stopped. He’ll be back soon. Just-“ she paused, “sucks for you.”

“Yeah”, he breathed. “Sucks for me.”

There was a long pause filled with (self)pity, until Nat finally picked up the conversation again.

“Hey, you wanna come over? I can hear you roaming around in your small kitchen of sadness and we’ve got Pizza and booze over here.”

Steve briefly considered declining her offer, but she was right. His cabins were empty and there was no way he’d spring for delivery. The month was close to ending and his bank account was empty.

“Sure”, he said, already pulling his shoes on, “but I’m wearing sweatpants and haven’t showered today so you guys are in for a treat.”

*

Outside, Steve was dumbstruck for a second, when he realized, that it was snowing. A little early in the year and not much, but it was snowing. The city turned into even more of a medieval dream when snow was sprinkled on top of it.

The red and blue roofs that crowned the houses of the inner city slowly began disappearing under a white coat, as he walked along the street to Natasha’s place. As he passed a small park, he decided to sit down for a second, not caring about his coat and pants getting soaked with snow-water.

There was this big, round library next to the park, that showed off it’s amazingly coloured red and beige brick wall on the outside, and looked like a librarian had a wet dream on the inside. It was the renovated rest of a small church that once stood here centuries ago.

Steve loved just looking at it. He always felt weird around old buildings. It felt illegal touching something that people had touched 600 years ago as well. There was a lot of these kinds of buildings here. Sometime in the future he wanted to tour around the city, looking at all of them, touching them, drawing them – maybe he could even make a day out of it, go eat someplace nice, maybe drive around to some castle close by.

He carefully looked down on himself and saw, that he was getting snowed in. Like he was a fixed part of this scenery he emerged himself into. It was a nice feeling, being part of his own exclusive moment in the dark. Nobody else was around, only him and the quiet gurgling of the city river that passed through right next to the library. It was dashingly peaceful.

Until it wasn’t.

Out of the blue, his brain attacked him with images of Bucky. Bucky’s damn smirk, his red lips swollen from a kiss that had gone on for a little too long, his eyes, the way he sat in class with his laptop, typing dirty messages to Steve all whilst looking as innocent as a puppy.

He sighed and stood up. Now was not the right time for a peaceful moment with himself. What he needed now was at least three shots of Wodka and some bantering with Sam and Nat. Everything else would figure itself out. He was almost sure of that.

*

Natasha lived in a two bedroom apartment near the university. Steve asked her five times already, how she managed to pay the rent, but so far she didn’t reveal her secret. His money was on a secret second job, working for the government as a spy or something. Or maybe her parents just had money; but he held on to his conspiracy for now.

Sam opened Steve the door with a loop sided grin on his face. Clearly they’d already started the drinking. He pulled off his coat to hang it on the door and turned around to Nat, spread all over the sofa with a bottle of the local beer in her hand. Nearly every town in Germany had their own beer and it all tasted the same, but Steve had pretty quickly learned, never to point that out to a German.

Sam pushed her feet away to sit down and shot Nat a pretend-mad look, when she decided to instead place her feet on his lap. Steve had rarely seen Nat this calm. She smiled a lot, chatted away and even let Sam pick the movie they were gonna watch.

Her place was nice, cozy even. Quite shocking, since Nat didn’t seem like a person for clutter and knick knacks. Steve sat down in the big, comfy armchair next to the couch and looked at his friends having fun exchanging a couple of verbal punches. As nice as this felt and as much as he liked this place, it felt wrong. Bucky was gone and they didn’t seem to care. Maybe he shouldn’t care either, he thought.

“You’re still thinking about Bucky, aren’t cha?” Nat caught his eyes and tried a small smile. “I get it. First time it happened, I freaked out. Thought he fell of something or got himself thrown into jail or something. But I learned that he always comes back.” She kicked Sam’s leg one last time before pulling her feet back and sitting up straight. “Tell you what, if he’s still not back by tomorrow, I’ll call his sister. Maybe he just had to go home.”

Steve nodded, feeling better about the situation but simultaneously worse for not knowing Bucky had a sister. It felt wrong feeling so anxious about someone he didn’t even know.

“Could you”, he swallowed, “could you maybe tell me a little about him? I feel so weird, like I don’t even know him. But I like him a lot. It’s”, he looked to the floor, “it feels wrong. I’m sitting here with you guys like I’m some part of his life and didn’t even know he had a sister.”

Sam rested a hand on Steve’s shoulder, “Buddy, that is not your fault. The guy is a locked vault. I only know him over colleagues but from what I’ve heard, he does not share. Like at all.”

“I know what I know because I snooped”, Nat chimed in, “once I finally had enough of him disappearing, I did some research, not all of it legal mind you so don’t go on telling the university that I used their databank to basically stalk a colleague. But yeah, he’s not like that. Knowing Bucky means knowing how he is as a human, not what his life story is. But I get why you feel like that. I know he likes you though.”

“He does”, Sam’s laughter filled the room, “that night at the bar he came back inside smiling like a mad man.”

“I don’t even know his deal!” Steve exclaimed, feeling a lot better already and ready to ramble.

“He’s a mess, like we all are.” Sam grinned and stood up. “Alright, enough with this. Steve, you need alcohol and Nat you could start the movie. We all need to get out heads off James Barnes.”


	8. The one in which all is well

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's over! I hope you liked the story. I am not really happy with it, but wanted to finish it, before starting something else. :)  
> Triggers:  
> \- Explicit violence: No  
> \- Explicit sex: No  
> \- Other: Strong language, alcohol, mentions of a car crash and scars, ptsd
> 
> Revised: no

Sunday came with way too much light and the sound of someone flushing the toilet. Steve found himself on Natasha’s couch, laying between two pillows, his head pushed uncomfortably to the left. He tried getting up, but not only was his world a spinning nightmare, he also felt every bone in his body and his neck felt like someone had shot him there. Fucking hell.

“Help”, he yelped out and was more than glad, when Sam appeared above him.

“Hey buddy”, the other man grinned, “you look comfortable.”

“I am in pain”, Steve groaned as he was pulled up. As he tried turning his head, a sharp pain flooded his body. “Goddamit!” He cursed.

“Language!” Natasha joined them from her bedroom and gave Steve a pitiful smile. “Poor baby”, she wandered off to her kitchen. “Anyone want coffee?”

Sam and Steve yelled ‘yes’ in unison as an answer, to which she chuckled.

Steve tried not to vomit, as he bent over to retrieve his phone. “Hey Sam”, he looked up and grinned, “where the hell did you sleep?”

“A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell”, his friend answered, but before Steve could investigate further Natasha came back and gave them both a stern look.

“He slept on the air mattress I have in my bedroom.” She turned to Sam, “don’t give him any ideas!”

Sam grinned dumbfounded and said with a heavy southern accent “of course not ma’am. Wouldn’t want little Stevie here thinking you got yourself a nice piece of ass like myself.”

Natasha scoffed and got back to her kitchen, leaving the two men giggling to themselves.

A buzzing noise made their heads turn. Steve picked up his phone and cocked an eyebrow, “well well well, see who’s back.”

“Bucky?” That was Natasha. She dried her hands on a dish towel and joined them on the couch, looking over Steve’s shoulder to his phone.

“Yeah”, Steve smiled, “he says sorry and wants to meet up. Has he texted any of you guys?”

They both checked and whilst Sam’s phone did not receive a message, Nat’s did.

“Jup, seems about right”, the red head said. “He said he’s back and well and hopes he didn’t freak me out.”

“Did he tell you why he was gone?” Steve was still mostly confused by Bucky’s sudden disappearance. He wasn’t mad or sad anymore. Just curious.

“Yeah”, Natasha scrunched her nose reading something on her phone and then put in her back pocket, “but he should talk to you about it. He’s being a baby so if he does something dumb just tell me and I’ll kick his ass or something.”

That did absolutely nothing to easy Steve’s mind. If anything, it made it worse. He tried pressing for more information, but Natasha simply ignored him and handed him a cup of coffee instead.

Sam still sat on the couch when they came back into the living room, looking like a sad puppy. “What? I’m not important enough to this dickhead to get a text? Unbelievable.” He scoffed and got a kick from Nat for it.

“Don’t pity yourself too much, he usually only texts me, I’m guessing he only made an exception this time for Steve, because he ditched him on date night.”

“Still”, Sam pouted, “a text would have been nice!”

“I don’t really get all of this either”, Steve said. “I just hope he’d alright and then we can pick up right were we left off, if”, he swallowed, “if he still wants that.”

Natasha rolled her eyes, “why are men so melodramatic all the time? First Bucky with his stupid shit, then Sam with his self-pity and now you’re acting like he’s gonna tell you he disappeared because he doesn’t like you anymore. I swear”, she shook her fist at her friends, “if y’all would just talk to each other like normal human beings this all could have been much easier and I wouldn’t feel like a truck drove over me from drinking with you two.”

*

Steve said his goodbyes a few hours and a big breakfast later. He was gonna meet with Bucky later that day and wanted to at least shower and clean up his place. This whole ordeal was getting quite ridiculous and overdramatic. So what Bucky needed time for himself, Steve wasn’t one to judge. And Nat was right, all was well. Even though it had been a dick move to not even warn Steve at all and letting him sit for three days without any clue of what’s happened. But no, he reminded himself, no hard feelings. All was well. All. Was. Well.

Steve made that his mantra, trying to adapt to Nat’s lackluster interest in Bucky’s disappearance. Biting down any anger he had. All was well, he said to himself as he cleaned his kitchen. All was well, he quietly hummed, as he made his bed. And then he just sat there, looking at the wall opposite to his desk and waited. Laptop open in front of him, but he couldn’t work.

He was just about to start the sad playlist again, when his doorbell rang.

Bucky looked sad.

That was the first thought Steve had and it made the mantra ‘all is well’ sound quite ironic.

“Hey”, Bucky said and stood in the doorway like a frightened deer. His hands pressed into the pockets of his coat, pulling in down, making him seem smaller than he was.

“Hey”, Steve said and tried a shy smile on the other man. “Wanna come in?”

“I don’t know if I should…” Bucky let the sentence trail off and Steve dropped the smile.

“You should. First of all because I don’t want my neighbors listening in and second off because you owe me some explaining and then maybe some making out.”

Bucky’s eyes widened at the last part. “You mean you’re not angry at me?”

Steve rubbed the bridge of his nose and gestured again for Bucky to come in, this time successfully.

This fucking guy.

As if Steve could ever shut the door on him. He might not know it, but Steve did. He still really liked Bucky. A lot. A terrifying amount, to be honest. No matter what would happen now.

As he closed the door and turned around, he said “no. I am not angry. I am confused and a little hurt, but you look like hell, so you probably already had your punishment. Now, what is it? Please tell me you didn’t rob a bank or some shit because this”, he moved his hand back and forth between himself and Bucky, “is illegal and stressful enough as is.”

Bucky clumsily sat down on Steve’s bed and smiled a wry smile. “I’m not sure you want to know the truth. It’s more of a 10th date thing, not really pre-first-date talk.”

“Just tell me. We’re adults. Let’s not do this dramatic shit”, Steve sighed, sitting down next to him.

Bucky looked tired. His hair was disheveled, and not in a sexy way, his clothes looked worn and he was shaking a little bit. He looked so small and sad that Steve – tiny small bean – Rogers, had the urge to protect the other at all costs.

“So”, Bucky scratched the back of his head, “I guess I’ll start at the beginning. A few years ago I was in a bad car crash, like, really bad. My arm”, he lifted the arm further away from Steve, “got hurt real bad and I got fucked up pretty badly in my head. Got some bad PTSD from it, that comes with phantom pain sometimes. And on those days I just forget. All of therapy, all of the work done to make this arm work and look presentable again is gone. I get to he nearest hospital and just ride it out with some painkillers and lots of shitty tv.”

“That’s what happened Friday?” Steve kept his voice calm and tried not to look at Bucky’s arm. He’d always covered it up with a long sleeve top. Steve never thought about it too much. But now…

“Yeah”, Bucky did not look at him, “Friday mornin’ I woke up in pain and got out of my apartement to get some help. Left my phone and my keys so”, he chuckled but it wasn’t coming from a place of joy, “last days were just great. I didn’t even have my I.D. on me so they had no history and it was just a whole lot of messed up.”

“You got back into your place?”

“Nah, I’m going over to Nat’s later. See if I can get someone to open my door on Monday.”

“I see”, Steve said and tilted his head, “and you’re fine now? No pain?”

Bucky shook his head, “no it’s gone for now. I mean it’s always a little numb around the elbow, but I’ve gotten used to that. It’s- oh fuck it, it’s easier to just show you.”

He pulled back a little and lifted his shirt above his head and whilst Steve was not really happy that the first time Bucky stripped for him it was in this context, his mind blanked the second he saw the arm. At first glance, it looked like a regular arm. But once he took a closer look, he could see the fine pattern of scars around the shoulder, reaching down to the elbow, which had a tiny metal guide right around the joint, and then continue down to the palm of Bucky’s hand.

He released a heap of air and shuffled closer, noticing how Bucky stiffened.

“Is this okay?” Steve looked up and locked eyes with the other man.

Only when Bucky nodded, he moved even closer and traced the scars along the arm with light fingers, keeping his focus on Bucky’s body language, ready to stop at any moment.

“It’s-“

“Hideous, I know. I look weird and it’s shiny and this fucking guide probably has to stay there for ever to help me move around heavy stuff without something dislocating but-“

Steve remembered how easily Bucky had been able to just lift him up a couple of weeks ago and snapped back up, “it’s not hideous, Buck.” He smiled, trying to make Bucky see that he was not disgusted or mad or even sad anymore. He understood now. And he was really happy Bucky was able to share this part of himself with him.

“That pattern, it looks like you’ve been struck by lightning or something. I won’t say it’s pretty or anything, since what happened to you is so not pretty, but it’s not hideous. I would much rather say it’s fascinating.”

“I can’t really see it that way”, Bucky said with a raw honesty in his voice that hurt Steve’s soul, because _of course_ he couldn’t.

Steve carefully took Bucky’s hand, checking in if it was okay. Bucky was still staring at the floor, but he didn’t flinch or pull away. Steve leaned into him the tiniest bit. “You don’t have to tell me about the car crash if you don’t want to.”

“It’s why I left Brooklyn”, Bucky said, “nobody died, if you think that’s what fucked me up. But my then best friend, the driver, he’s now paralyzed from the waist down and his girlfriend had head trauma and will never be quite the same. But me? I got picked out by Stark Tech for a trial and three months of operations later I had my arm back. Just like that.”

“Survivors guilt”, Steve muttered, “you’re the only one that got away without lasting damage, or so you think. Comparing pain isn’t healthy, but sometimes you can’t help it.”

Bucky looked over to him and nodded, “yeah. My psychologist said that’s what’s causing the phantom pain. I want there to be pain, because then there’s justice. Then we all got lasting damage, not just the other two.”

“Makes sense”, Steve shuffled closer once more and rubbed small circles on Bucky’s bare back with his free hand. “I’m glad you told me, even though you were right, this is absolutely no pre-first-date-stuff.” He smiled and was happy to see Bucky smiling too.

“I’m sorry this happened, I really like you, maybe too much even. I think I got scared and triggered this to happen. Not to say it’s your fault, but mine.”

“Nat kept me sane”, Steve laughed a little, “she provided me with booze and made me realize that this isn’t a big, dramatic thing. It happened. And that’s fine. And we talked about it, which is also fine.”

All is well, he thought again.

“Who would have guessed that this would be the big dramatic break, not the illegal sneaking around stuff.” Bucky grinned a weak grin.

“Yeah about that, you really should start locking the door to your office when we’re in there.”

Bucky laughed, but it didn’t seem sincere. “So”, he asked with a shake in his voice, “you want this to continue? Even after knowing that I am at flight risk?”

Steve smacked his lips, “I never said I wanted to stop. I really like you, Buck. Not just the hooking up, I like talking to you, I like your friends, I like the way I feel when I’m with you. That didn’t change. You can always make up for the missed date and if you’re in pain again, you can always tell me. Or not, I’ll know now and leave you your space. But you’re not alone, you know that, right? You got great friends.”

“Yeah”, Bucky smiled and this time it reached his eyes. Suddenly he groaned and wiped over his eyes, “Shit. I still gotta text Sam.”

“You didn’t text him all day?” Steve laughed, “the guy was pissed at you when Nat and I heard from you and he didn’t.”

Bucky leaned into Steve and put his head back dramatically, “that means I gotta have this talk with him too, right?”

“You should at least text him, I don’t think he’ll press for information.” Steve tried very hard not to focus on Bucky’s bare chest, that was now clearly visible for him. Now was not the time to marvel at the other man’s physique, even though he made a mental note of asking Bucky if he could draw him once the timing was better.

“Hey”, he shoved Bucky’s shoulder and smiled, “you wanna stay here for the night? You could shower, we can put your clothes in the washer and then maybe you’ll feel like a full person again tomorrow? Did you even eat today?”

Bucky shrugged, “I haven’t really been hungry since Thursday and I don’t want to impose-“

“Nonsense”, Steve stood up so quickly Bucky almost fell over, “I’ll text Nat, you go shower and then we’ll sort out the other stuff in the morning alright?”

Bucky was silent.

“Hey”, he placed a hand under Bucky’s chin and smiled, “it’s fine. I want you here.”

*

When they woke up, time felt surreal. It was Monday, but it _felt_ like a Sunday. Steve ditched his morning class to allow them to sleep in at least a little bit, so that he could make sure Bucky ate and then deliver him to Nat, who volunteered to help him get into his apartment.

As he saw them walk away together, already bickering again, he once again thought: all is well.


End file.
